After Winter Comes Spring (Winter adé)

My mother gave birth to me here, in front of this railroad crossing.

In an ambulance.

Grandmother helped her.

On a warm July night in 1947.

My childhood home in the suburb of Planitz housed miners

who hewed coal for the local coking plant.

Today, Zwickau's mines are closed down and the coal is imported.

My mother turned 27 that day.

In her diary she wrote:

"What a wonderful birthday present you are!

Dad's very happy, even though you're not the son he wanted."

Is your chest tattooed as well? Can you show me?

Go on, then!

Terrific! And your back as well?

What kind of women are they?

Beautiful women.

At the age of 19 I left this town to go my own way:

I learned a trade, got married, got divorced.

I took a furnished room, found varying but intensive work.

I found a steady job, had my daughter, married again.

I studied while raising a child, got divorced again.

I was determined to do meaningful work.

I know many women whose anxieties and longings I share.

The self-assurance of my almost-adult daughter disconcerts me

yet fills me with hope.

It's already lit up.

So we ride into the mine.

So we ride into the mine.

Into the mine.

Into the mine.

Fast train to Sassnitz Hafen

via Altenburg, Leipzig, Berlin, Neubrandenburg and Rügendamm.

All aboard and shut the doors. Exercise caution while the train departs.

GOODBYE WINTER

At the age of 40 I set out once again from the town of my childhood

to discover how others have lived and how they want to live.

During my travels we'll talk to each other, at work and at home,

both by appointment and by chance.

Sometimes we'll just look at them,

the women and girls of this country.

We've arranged to travel with Hiltrud Kuhlmann.

She's 42 and works in advertising. She lives in Berlin.

Everyone calls her "Hillu."

Well, I have so many kids, and they're all so different.

So it's really interesting.

Uwe came first. I had him with my first husband.

The marriage didn't last. It ended after nine years.

Then... - Nine years is a long time. - Yes. - Unfortunately?

Can we start again? - Just keep on talking!

Just carry on. - It was a stupid marriage.

I think my upbringing prevented me from getting out of it at the right time. Pity!

What kind of upbringing? What was your childhood like?

There were six of us kids, and our father was extremely authoritarian.

I love him very much, in spite of that,

and I'm definitely often unfair to my mother.

And the different feelings I have for them...

I simply can't explain them. They just are.

And the authoritarian atmosphere at home made our dad always seem to be in the right.

And I probably projected that onto my marriage.

I was 19. Uwe was born when I was 20.

It took me years to free myself from the idea

that the father or the husband came first.

How did that affect your marriage?

In real terms. - Well, you know...

With Braatz... That was my first husband's surname.

I always called him Braatz.

I slept with him once, got pregnant,

and spent the next two or three years

telling myself that he was the love of my life,

that this was the real thing.

And I suppose I was afraid of admitting defeat to my family,

or to myself. We all have our motives.

But it pretty soon became apparent

that the two of us had different hopes and expectations.

Then I was single for a while.

I wasn't single, really. I met a guy I'd dated briefly before I was married.

He was a bachelor and glad that I was available again.

And he moved right in!

I really don't know what I was playing at:

straight into the next relationship!

Humans must be built that way:

always looking for something to hold on to.

But it didn't work out. It wasn't my fault, I got along with him.

But he and Uwe just weren't compatible.

I can see now that I expected too much of him.

I just thought he'd feel the same way about Uwe as I did.

But he didn't. Why would he? But that's what I expected.

And when reality doesn't match your rosy dreams

things come to a head pretty quickly all on their own. It's inevitable.

Then I took a break and was alone with Uwe for two years.

But it wasn't a bad time. We did a lot of stuff together.

You don't have to consider anyone else, you can do what you like.

Finally, we got to a point where we were looking for a new partner.

And I said: "OK, we'll only look for a man who has a child."

I wanted to give and receive in equal measure.

And this whole business seemed to be extremely important to me.

I didn't want to go through the whole father-husband routine again.

Because I recognized how unfair I'd been. Fine: a man with a child.

So we checked the newspaper ads for ages and ages.

And then I wrote to someone. - What was the ad like?

How was it worded? - It's such a long time ago...

He was looking for a woman who was active and well-proportioned.

"Well-proportioned" put me off at first, but then I thought: "Hell, just write to him!"

And he had a child? - He did. I only wrote to him because of that.

He replied, I called him, we met, took a look at each other.

It's a weird situation, but if you don't take it too seriously, it's fine.

We took a look at each other and decided to meet again the next day.

We already knew everything was OK.

The beginning I found very positive, if you can say that.

I was on cloud nine, deeply in love with my Peter,

my new husband.

I was totally besotted!

Completely passionate. It was beautiful.

And of course,

everything else was important too but played second fiddle.

As important as Uwe had been to me,

my relationship with him was never the same again.

And I never built up a relationship like that with my new daughter Beate either.

Because the early period was so dominated by Peter and me.

Because we had so much...

to tell each other, so much to do together.

We both made new friends through each other.

We were incredibly active, as a family, too, of course.

But the hermetically sealed mother-son unit I'd had before

was no longer the same.

The extremely close relationship I'd had with my son was gone.

I really did want to extend our family,

but the difficulty of doing that soon became apparent

because little Beate was very different from me.

She had a right to be different: people are the way they are.

And, of course, she'd experienced things that had left their mark on her.

So I still find it difficult... A deer! A deer!

There, look! - Where? Oh!

I still find it very difficult to treat the two children absolutely equally.

And that worries me.

So that sometimes...

my rational side and my emotions are at odds with each other.

Tell me again: Why and when did you decide to have a child together?

Right away. After all, I was already 33. Time was running out.

And I really wanted a child from my Peter, and he wanted that, too.

So I stopped taking the pill and in no time I was pregnant.

That really was a lovely time.

The pregnancy was lovely. No complications.

When Uwe was 14

he helped out at discos in an orphanage.

And he soon brought Heidi home with him.

Their relationship wasn't all that serious, they were both only 14.

That's normal. And it was over pretty quickly.

But what remained was Heidi. She felt at home in our family

and having another person didn't bother me either.

I'd grown up in a family with lots of kids, so it was completely normal for me.

Heidi was there at weekends and in the holidays, too.

She'd bring other kids from her orphanage along too,

so we got to know a lot of them.

I think we're an important part of our Heidi's life.

And that during those years

we gave her a family life and lots of warmth and support,

which she didn't get in her orphanage.

They're really sad, those orphanages.

But their relationship picked up again bit by bit when they were 17.

Heidi said she and Uwe were going to try again.

I said: "Bring your sleeping bag, move in with Uwe and give it a try."

I don't think the other kids will have it that easy, but she was family.

So they tried again.

But we were continually shocked by the coarse tone between young people nowadays.

It was very different to our idea of love and the whole courtship process.

Heidi got an apartment at 18, Uwe joined the army.

And the two of them, well, I don't know...

They often argued with each other due to their different expectations of life.

We even said: "Pack it in!"

But no, they wanted a child,

so that Uwe could love it from the distance of the army barracks,

and so that Heidi would have something of her own at last.

And as idiotic as it seemed to us,

and although we foresaw endless difficulties, they went ahead and had a son, Paul.

So we had little Paul, but the relationship between Uwe and Heidi didn't last.

But it's complicated: she's still our child number four.

I feel very maternal feelings towards her,

and I'm very sad if she doesn't call. I call her sometimes, she calls me, too...

But she doesn't visit so often now because her relationship with Uwe is difficult.

And I really, really want

to keep an eye on how Paul develops.

Because Heidi has her own problems to overcome.

So I always try to keep an eye on how he's developing.

But I know I can't influence it.

But her time in the orphanage left its mark on her, I'd say.

And in some respects it's left her incapable of relating to things

that we don't have any problems with.

She's always going to find it difficult

to allow herself to experience a genuinely deep, loving relationship.

She found it difficult with Paul at first,

and it's been the same with all her partners as well.

How's your marriage now? Are there conflicts? Are you still in love?

Well, the great passion changes over time. Daily life detracts from it.

Sometimes you wish it were otherwise,

that this initial energy would return.

But it's still a good partnership.

I need my Peter, he needs me.

The children are growing and growing with us and feel secure.

Uwe now lives in his own apartment and...